Thursday, June 15, 2017

David Levan, who was trying to get a license for a racino [racetrack and casino] has withdrawn his request. The immediate threat to the area is now gone. Some municipal actions will continue, such as the referendum by the township residents.

But lest we relax too much, understand a larger threat. The Pennsylvania House has passed a law making legal small slots and other small games of chance machines across the state. It would result in seeing slot machines just about everywhere [doubtful you'll find one in a Church!]. You'll find them in bars, restaurants, grocery stores, gas stations, just about every retail nook and cranny in the state.

There is hope, as the bill is now in the Pennsylvania Senate and there is time to contact the Senators and give them a resounding "NO!". Please contact your State Senator ASAP and just say "'NO!"

GettysBLOG

We support the Roadmap to Reform!

“Be steadfast in your anger, be sure in your convictions, be moved by the right and certainty that abuse of power must be defeated at every turn; uphold Liberty as the just reward of a watchful people, and let not those who have infringed upon that Liberty steal it away from you. Never loosen your grip on Liberty!" -- GettysBLOG

Tuesday, May 30, 2017

May 30, 2017Citizens Stand Against the Racino!Our big news is that the citizens of Freedom Township are
standing up for themselves. They don’t want or need a harness racing track
and huge casino in their mostly rural Township. They found a provision
in the 2nd Class Township Code that allows a VOTE, a Referendum, on banning
Horse Race Tracks from the Township. This is the first time a casino
proposal can be stopped by the people who would suffer the most from it. The citizens of Freedom Township, Adams County, PA have met
the criteria for the referendum provision in the Township Code.
In this case, the first criteria were the signatures of 46.5 registered
voters. Volunteers from Freedom Township went door to door over one
weekend and collected the notarized signatures of 120 registered voters,
which they presented to the Supervisors on May 10 along with 270 additional
signatures. An additional requirement was that the proposed racetrack be
less than 50 air miles from the center of an existing licensed
racetrack. An air mile is 6,076.11 ft., longer than a land mile. No
Casino Gettysburg employed professional surveyors who determined, in
two different analyses, that the center of the proposed track is 49.5 Air
Miles from the center of Penn National Race Track in Grantville, PA. That’s
close! The Code states that if these two criteria are met the
referendum is mandatory. The Supervisors
have been examining it and will meet June 14 at 8PM to announce their
decision. In addition, LeVan has submitted his 3rd text amendment to the
Township. The Planning Commission hasn’t liked the first two, but
we’ll find out at their next meeting at 7PM on June 7 what they think of
this latest try. Both meetings will be at the Greenmount Fire Hall, 3095
Emmitsburg Rd., Gettysburg.We gave public comment to the last Horse Racing Commission
meeting, letting them know about the Referendum. LeVan still hasn’t
applied for the license, but he has until June 14. With a referendum
looming, he may be having difficulty getting funding, especially since the
market is saturated.We noticed that LeVan is asking lots of influential
groups to endorse his project. So far, it’s been endorsed by the
Chamber of Commerce and the Adams County Economic Development Authority but
Destination Gettysburg stayed neutral. Many people endorsed his last two
attempts to build a casino in Gettysburg but it didn’t help. He still
never got a single vote from the PA Gaming Control Board!HOW YOU CAN HELP: Write a letter to
the editor of your local paper to let them know how you feel about a
proposed casino in Gettysburg. This helps more people find our website and sign
the petition. If you are nearby, e-mail us to get a sign for your
yard to spread the word. Please donate if possible. Stay current
at www.NoCasinoGettysburg.ORG.

GettysBLOG

We support the Roadmap to Reform!

“Be steadfast in your anger, be sure in your convictions, be moved by the right and certainty that abuse of power must be defeated at every turn; uphold Liberty as the just reward of a watchful people, and let not those who have infringed upon that Liberty steal it away from you. Never loosen your grip on Liberty!" -- GettysBLOG

Thursday, May 04, 2017

Referendum on Racino Recommended by Freedom Township Voters,
PlannersGettysburg, Pa. The proposed Gettysburg
racino hit a wall tonight when Freedom Township residents asked for a
Referendum* to prohibit a racetrack from being built in Freedom Township, and
the Freedom Township Planning Commission voted unanimously to recommend it to
the Supervisors.Freedom Township residents have been actively
fighting Mason-Dixon Downs with a door to door petition campaign throughout the
township. No Casino Gettysburg signs dot the rural landscape. The “We Are
Freedom” team of No Casino Gettysburg discussed their work during public
comments at Wednesday’s Freedom Township Planning Commission meeting. Rebecca
Kurnat, a working wife and mother, explained during public comments that their
petition drive is almost finished and the numbers of signers will be reported
at the Freedom Supervisors meeting on May 10. Kurnat
explained, “During our campaign, we uncovered information that Referendum are
legal in PA on the question of whether a horse track can be prohibited in a
township. We decided to ask the Planning Commission to recommend that the
Supervisors conduct such a referendum. After talking to so many citizens of the
Township, we feel positive we could win such a vote.” After
once again tabling the zoning text amendment requested by Mason-Dixon Downs, the
five-member planning board voted unanimously to recommend to the Supervisors
that they conduct a referendum.Charles
McElhose of Freedom said he had collected 44 signatures himself going door to
door in his neighborhood. “Ninety percent of the people I spoke with opposed
the racino”, he said. “No one I talked to was for it. There is a lot of
sentiment against it in Freedom.” The volunteers, all Freedom voters,
first met in a local home on April 26 and decided to divide up the
approximately 400 home township among themselves. In
the hot township building, crammed with over 100 people, 15 residents spoke
against the racino, and one married couple spoke for it. Once comments were
opened to non-Freedom persons, there were several pro-casino speeches. The
proposed racino must receive approvals from several state and local entities: a
rezoning by Freedom Township in Adams County, a harness racing license from the
Pennsylvania Horse Racing Commission, and a casino license from the
Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board. The Freedom Township Supervisors will
meet Wed May 10 at 8PM at the Township Building, 2184 Pumping Station Rd,
Fairfield, PA 17320, to consider plans for the proposed racetrack and casino.
The recommendation for a referendum will be considered at that meeting.This
is the third proposal for casino development in Gettysburg, following
unsuccessful attempts in 2005 and 2011 by the same developer, David LeVan. The
new plan, located at the Rt. 15-Steinwehr Ave exit, would place a harness
racing track, large casino with several restaurants, 1800 slots and table
games, a hotel, conference center, restaurant and spa at Route 15 and
Emmitsburg Road. This exit is the first highway entrance to Pennsylvania and
Gettysburg from the south. The road leads directly to the national park and
through the site of Pickett’s Charge, the Confederate attack on the last day of
the Battle of Gettysburg that resulted in massive casualties and ended Gen.
Robert E. Lee’s advance into Pennsylvania.###We are Freedom is a committee of No
Casino Gettysburg, an all-volunteer citizens’ advocacy group dedicated to
saving historic Gettysburg, Pennsylvania and the surrounding area from becoming
a casino town. Formed in 2005, the organization has defeated two major
proposals, and is now fighting a third proposal – all from the same developer –
near the hallowed ground of the Gettysburg National Military Park and the
Eisenhower National Historic Site.. Learn more at NoCasinoGettysburg.org. *Referendum
in PAhttp://www.palwv.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/259_Referendum-Handbook-1999.pdf
p 20Horse Racing Voters may prohibit horse race meetings
in second class townships located within 50 air miles of an existing race
track.1 The issue may be placed on the ballot by a resolution of the board of
supervisors or must be placed on the ballot when the board of supervisors has
received a petition of registered voters comprising at least 25 percent of the
highest number of votes cast for a public office in the township at the last
preceding municipal election. The resolution is submitted to the county
board of elections. Following a positive vote in the referendum, the
board of supervisors is authorized to adopt an ordinance prohibiting horse race
meets. The first referendum on this issue was held in November, 1991.
Voters in Cranberry Township, Butler County approved a referendum prohibiting
horse racing within the township. Reference 1. 53 P.S. 66549;
Second Class Township Code, Section 1549.

GettysBLOG

We support the Roadmap to Reform!

“Be steadfast in your anger, be sure in your convictions, be moved by the right and certainty that abuse of power must be defeated at every turn; uphold Liberty as the just reward of a watchful people, and let not those who have infringed upon that Liberty steal it away from you. Never loosen your grip on Liberty!" -- GettysBLOG

Wednesday, October 21, 2015

T. J. Stiles [author of Pulitzer Prize winning The
First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt, and Jesse
James, Last Rebel of the Civil War] gives us a deep understanding of
George Armstrong Custer in his new book Custer’s Trials [Alfred Knopf, in
stores October 27, advanced ordering at Amazon].

In “Rise”, the
first part of Custer’s Trials, Stiles takes us on a well-crafted journey
through Custer’s youth, and through the United States Military Academy at West
Point, where he excelled at few things military or academic, and including his
court-martial while a graduate awaiting orders.It then chronicles the career of the “boy-General” throughout hismeteoric rise in rank and legend during the
Civil War.At the same time Stiles, relates
aspects of Custer’s personal life and his romances, culminating in his marriage
to Elizabeth “Libbie” Bacon.

He persevered at West Point, and though he was last in his
class academically and first in demerits, he succeeded in passing his exams, thus
becoming eligible for graduation.In
spite of all of the negatives, Custer showed himself to possess many qualities
the military desired in its officers: poise, creative thought, conventional and
unconventional avenues to problem solving, the ability to get others motivated,
and stature, into which he grew through his activities, mostly in the course of
breaking rules…rules by which he abided just enough to get by.In short, Custer, with the assistance of West
Point, taught himself leadership.It was
not the leadership of someone who proclaims himself the leader, it is the one
who leads from the front and succeeds because others willingly follow.And
all the while building his repertoire of exploits, he began building
friendships with his classmates, and with politicians in hopes of receiving
assistance to further his career at his pace.

Stiles relates the details of his first trial: a
court-martial before he could leave West Point after graduation.The court found him guilty and ordered no
punishment except a reprimand in orders.And thus began the hard fighting and fast promotions of his successful
and charmed Civil War career.

Custer’s Civil War experiences were as charmed and full of
good fortune as were his West Point experiences.He grew to expect this of himself - indeed,
he was fearless in battle, leading from the front of his unit, sword in hand,
and not just as a symbol, but a weapon he used with devastating effect in every
engagement.

But there was another Custer – a self-serving Custer, who
cultivated friends, and curried favor with friendly higher-ups.This was the insecure Custer, as changeable
as the times, yet as constant as the sunrise with his contradictions.In this manner Stiles presents Custer as a man
who embraced the three main realms of his life – the private, public and
professional realms, sometimes mixing them but only to his advantage.In each he was comfortable and moved about in
them freely, enjoying the moments to their fullest, yet constantly laying and
cultivating the groundwork for advancement in all three realms.Sometimes conniving, and never missing an opportunity
to not only extol the virtues of his latest adventure, but enhance them as
well.

Custer’s rise through the ranks to generalship is well
known.But Stiles laces the telling with
personal details often missed in many works of history involving Custer, and
details the patronage afforded him by Generals McClellan, Pleasonton, and
Sheridan.

One measure of Custer’s leadership and how it affected his
men in the Michigan Brigade was when they began to copy his affectation of the
famous red necktie he wore with his gaudy uniform.But the men both loved and respected him for
his personal courage and his innate ability to know the lay of the land on
which they fought, and how he would invariably place them in the best position
to succeed to victory.Time after time Custer
won the hearts of the Union thanks to the newspaper coverage of the war [which
he curried], and was a favorite subject of sketch artist Alfred Waud.

Custer married Libbie on February 9th, 1864, and
when campaigning began again in the spring, Custer took the field under Phil
Sheridan, and Libbie moved back to a boarding house in Washington.There Libbie was able to have access to the
influential politicians, and even to the President himself.She
charmed them all and won favor for her Armstrong, as family called him.

His war culminated in the surrender at Appomattox.

No one amassed the legendary success amid the events of the
US Civil War like Custer did.

------------------------------------------------------->

In “Fall”, the
second half of Stiles' epic biography of Custer, Stiles chronicles the last
decade and a half of George Armstrong Custer’s life.What many biographers gloss over or omit
entirely is the path to Little Big Horn that Custer followedfrom the end of the war, but not Stiles.

First sent to Texas to restore law and order in a state
devastated by the war, he took Libbie along.Life was different in the post-war US Army. There was no more war, and he was still
commanding volunteers.Custer was forced
to use a hard hand even at controlling his own troops, including head-shaving,
whipping and executions.For a man who’s
leadership was repeatedly proven in combat, the lack of it was proven in
peace.It was a duty for which he was unsuited,
and unable to adapt.Nor would his
conservative Democrat views on race suffer the change that the war had
wrought.And Libbie shared those
feelings.

Yet Custer struggled to come to terms with the new reality
of the Freedmen.He began to think about
redefining himself.He did so in his
testimony before a subcommittee of the Committee on Reconstruction, advocating
black suffrage, and the continuation of the Freedmen’s Bureau.Custer’s testimony was in line with that of
other officers newly returned from the post war South.Collectively, they pointed to the regressive
results of President Johnson’s policies.The ensuing Civil Rights bill was vetoed by Johnson, and in effect, was
a declaration of war between the conservative President and the Radical
Republicans in Congress.But Custer’s
testimony belied his personal beliefs.Once again he was currying political favor from those who controlled
Congress.Then he went on a political
tour with President Johnson, evoking the wrath of Ulysses Grant.Grant ordered Custer to join the 7th
US Cavalry at Fort Riley without delay.Custer soon realized how badly he had erred in publicly supporting
Johnson.

A year later found Custer facing his second court-martial,
this time for absenting himself from his command without the proper
authority.He had left Fort Wallace,
Kansas apparently to get to Libbie, and traveled 275 miles to Fort Harker when
his command was about to launch a campaign against the Indians.Even worse, he had ordered a detachment of 75
men and three officers to escort the ambulance in which he rode.And it continued to get even worse.Custer ignored an attack on some of his men
by Indians, sent a detachment out after deserters with orders to bring none
back alive, and eventually had three deserters shot, but not killed, and did
not allow them to be treated for their wounds – all without a trial.In a rather long proceeding, Custer was found
guilty across the board and sentenced to one year’s suspension and forfeiture
of his pay.Ultimately the Indians
intervened and Sherman and Sheridan petitioned Grant to restore Custer to the 7th
US Cavalry.Grant complied, if only to
keep Custer in the field and out of politics and out of trouble.

Thus Custer began the phase of his career that would mark
him as “Indian Killer.”He operated in
Kansas and Oklahoma, destroying Indian villages, and chasing after famous
Indian leaders such as Black Kettle.

Unable to rise in rank, Custer attempted to end his Army
career and support himself and Libbie in a style more grand than Army pay could
provide.Custer took an extended leave, and made a disastrous
foray into the world of Wall Street.He
sought funds to support a silver mine in Colorado.It failed when the mine failed.

In 1871, Custer returned to the Army, stationed in Kentucky
to suppress the Ku Klux Klan and the illegal manufacture of moonshine
alcohol.It was boring duty.Custer yearned for the openness of the Great
Plains.He turned to writing there, and
while he had a market for his work, it was too small to allow him to leave the
Army.

In the Spring of 1873, Custer received word that the 7th
Cavalry was being reassigned north to the Dakota Territory.He and Libby began packing.Over the next three years, he mounted three
great expeditions: along the Yellowstone River in 1873 - fighting battles on
August 4th and August 11th; the Black Hills Expedition in
1874; and finally, the Little Big Horn Expedition in 1876.

The noted historian Frederick Jackson Turner who wrote at
the end of the 19th century and for 3 decades into the 20th,
formulated the Frontier Thesis, which
was presented as a paper to the American Historical Association in Chicago, July 12, 1893,
titled “The Significance of the Frontier
in American History.” It first appeared in the Proceedings of the State
Historical Society of Wisconsin, December 14, 1893.He cites the 1890 census report’s
proclamation that, “…‘Up to and including 1880 the country had a frontier of
settlement, but at present the unsettled area has been so broken into by
isolated bodies of settlement that there can hardly be said to be a frontier
line. In the discussion of its extent, its westward movement, etc., it can not,
therefore, any longer have a place in the census reports.’ This brief official
statement marks the closing of a great historic movement. Up to our own day
American history has been in a large degree the history of the colonization of
the Great West. The existence of an area of free land, its continuous
recession, and the advance of American settlement westward, explain American
development.”

In his paper, Turner presents the role of the frontier as
the developer of Americanism, that the farther from the Atlantic Coast one got
on the way west, the farther they got from the influence of their European
roots.The Frontier was the blacksmith’s
hammer, forge and tempering bucket that produced American Exceptionalism and
American Identity.

In the fifteen years from the end of the Civil War to the
end of the Frontier, as the Census report put it, there was perhaps no other
person whose day-to-day life on that Frontier had more influence in the final
forging of the American Identity and Exceptionalism than George Armstrong
Custer.

Stiles' book, 472 pages not including acknowledgements, is a
most thorough, detailed, and well-supported biography.The cast of characters is rich, and most are
well known, but even the lesser known help to paint the portrait, often filling
in gaps.The principals are fascinating,
and brought down from their legendary status by relating their intimate
interactions and thoughts.George
Armstrong Custer was a truly great soldier during the Civil War.The absence of war was a large part of his
undoing, for it forced him into realms he had not entered before, that he was
unable to manipulate to his advantage, and for which he was wholly unprepared.

Custer’s Trials is the consummate biography of George Armstrong
Custer.

Available in stores October 27th, 2015.Also available to preorder at Amazon here.

------------------------------------------------------->

GettysBLOG

We support the Roadmap to Reform!

“Be steadfast in your anger, be sure in your convictions, be moved by the right and certainty that abuse of power must be defeated at every turn; uphold Liberty as the just reward of a watchful people, and let not those who have infringed upon that Liberty steal it away from you. Never loosen your grip on Liberty!" -- GettysBLOG

Alert! Alert! Alert! Alert!

Join the NoCasinoGettysburg Network!

Timely Quotes

"Seize the power back from those who would deny you its use and protection; wield it then for yourselves to secure your lives, your liberty, and your honor!"--GettysBLOG

"Be steadfast in your anger, be sure in your convictions, be moved by the right and certainty that abuse of power must be defeated at every turn; uphold Liberty as the just reward of a watchful people, and let not those who have infringed upon that Liberty steal it away from you. Never loosen your grip on Liberty!"--GettysBLOG

"Hubris is a contagious disease found in politicians who have been in office too long."--GettysBLOG

"Greed knows no limits, and has no character. Greed endures no absolute moral values, and has its own ethics. Greed has no memories but vengeful ones. Greed has no friends and no family, only partners, and partners are expendable. Greed consumes and corrupts absolutely. Greed is blind to itself."--GettysBLOG

"With all its misleading promises about the benefits of a casino, maybe Chance investors really do think they are running a charitable institution. We certainly do not begrudge them their attempt to profit from Pennsylvania's decision to legalize gambling; we only ask that they find someplace else to put their casino. They can put their slot machines anywhere, but no one can move Gettysburg's hallowed ground."--Jim Lighthizer, CWPT

"When we show respect and try to keep a casino from being built near sacred ground in Gettysburg, we show respect for those who fight and for those who did fight. We show respect when we take care of sacred earth. We do not show respect when we even consider putting a casino within a mile of one of the holiest spots in American history at Gettysburg. That idea is so stunningly inappropriate that it makes my head spin."--Ben Stein

"They [the battlefields] were places where people died in incredible agony, alone, by themselves, for causes that they had to have believed in with every cell in their body. And for us to neglect them now and to say it is just as meaningful to have a casino where people are going to put dimes in a slot machine as to have a place where people gave up their lives for a cause theybelieved in it's just insanity."--Ben Stein

TIF & Gettysburg Crossing

Pertinent Quotations

"In great deeds something abides. On great fields something stays. Forms change and pass; bodies disappear, but spirits linger, to consecrate ground for the vision-place of souls. And reverent men and women from afar, and generations that know us not and that we know not of, heart-drawn to see where and by whom great things were suffered and done for them, shall come to this deathless field to ponder and dream; And lo! the shadow of a mighty presence shall wrap them in its bosom, and the power of the vision pass into their souls."--Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain

"The shadows of age are rapidly stealing upon us. Our burdens are like the loaded knapsack on the evening of a long and weary march, growing heavier at every pace. The severing of the links to a heroic and noble young manhood, when generous courage was spurred by ambitious hope, goes on, but you have lived to see spring up as the result of your suffering, toil and victory the most powerful nation of history and the most beneficent government ever established. While you are in the sear and yellow leaf your country is in the spring-time of the new life your victory gave it. This is your abundant and sufficient reward." --Rufus R. Dawes

"I hope to live long enough to see my surviving comrades march side by side with the Union veterans along Pennsylvania Avenue, and then I will die happy." --James Longstreet

"That we can come here today and in the presence of thousands and tens of thousands of the survivors of the gallant army of Northern Virginia and their descendants, establish such an enduring monument by their hospitable welcome and acclaim, is conclusive proof of the uniting of the sections, and a universal confession that all that was done was well done, that the battle had to be fought, that the sections had to be tried, but that in the end, the result has inured to the common benefit of all." --William Howard Taft

"I exhort you never to debase the moral currency or to lower the standard of rectitude, but to try others by the final maxim that governs your own lives, and to suffer no man and no cause to escape the undying penalty which history has the power to inflict on wrong." --Lord Acton

"Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end...liberty is the only object which benefits all alike, and provokes no sincere opposition...The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern...Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." --Lord Acton

"It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace--but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!" --Patrick Henry

"These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph." --Thomas Paine

"The way to secure liberty is to place it in the people's hands, that is, to give them the power at all times to defend it in the legislature and in the courts of justice" --John Adams

"Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual." --Thomas Jefferson

"No man has a natural right to commit aggression on the equal rights of another, and this is all from which the laws ought to restrain him; the idea is quite unfounded that on entering into society we give up any natural rights." --Thomas Jefferson

"An honest man can feel no pleasure in the exercise of power over his fellow citizens." --Thomas Jefferson

"The protection of our citizens, the spirit and honor of our country, require that force should be interposed to a certain degree." --Thomas Jefferson

"Peace and friendship with all mankind is our wisest policy, and I wish we may be permitted to pursue it. But the temper and folly of our enemies may not leave this in our choice." --Thomas Jefferson

"To draw around the whole nation the strength of the General Government as a barrier against foreign foes... is [one of the] functions of the General Government on which [our citizens] have a right to call." --Thomas Jefferson

"It is our duty still to endeavor to avoid war; but if it shall actually take place, no matter by whom brought on, we must defend ourselves. If our house be on fire, without inquiring whether it was fired from within or without, we must try to extinguish it." --Thomas Jefferson

"I am ever unwilling that [peace] should be disturbed as long as the rights and interests of the nations can be preserved. But whensoever hostile aggressions on these require a resort to war, we must meet our duty and convince the world that we are just friends and brave enemies." --Thomas Jefferson

"By nature's law, man is at peace with man till some aggression is committed, which, by the same law, authorizes one to destroy another as his enemy." --Thomas Jefferson

"I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man." --Thomas Jefferson

"Our duty to ourselves, to posterity, and to mankind, call on us by every motive which is sacred or honorable, to watch over the safety of our beloved country during the troubles which agitate and convulse the residue of the world, and to sacrifice to that all personal and local considerations." --Thomas Jefferson

"It is an essential attribute of the jurisdiction of every country to preserve peace, to punish acts in breach of it, and to restore property taken by force within its limits." --Thomas Jefferson

"By nature's law, man is at peace with man till some aggression is committed, which, by the same law, authorizes one to destroy another as his enemy." --Thomas Jefferson

"Peace and friendship with all mankind is our wisest policy, and I wish we may be permitted to pursue it. But the temper and folly of our enemies may not leave this in our choice." --Thomas Jefferson

"We must indeed all hang together, or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately." --Benjamin Franklin

"I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." --James Madison

"Public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed." --Abraham Lincoln

"At what point shall we expect the approach of danger? By what means shall we fortify against it? Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant, to step the Ocean, and crush us at a blow? Never! All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest; with a Buonaparte for a commander, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the Blue Ridge, in a trial of a thousand years. At what point, then, is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide." --Abraham Lincoln

"The probability that we may fall in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe to be just; it shall not deter me." --Abraham Lincoln

"Property is the fruit of labor...property is desirable...is a positive good in the world. That some should be rich shows that others may become rich, and hence is just encouragementto industry and enterprise. Let not him who is houseless pull down the house of another; but let him labor diligently and build one for himself, thus by example assuring that his own shall be safe from violence when built." --Abraham Lincoln

"We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others, the same word many mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men's labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called by the same name - liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different and incompatible names - liberty and tyranny." --Abraham Lincoln

"If all do not join now to save the good old ship of the Union this voyage nobody will have a chance to pilot her on another voyage." --Abraham Lincoln

"It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement; and who, at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat." --Theodore Roosevelt

"Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat." --Theodore Roosevelt

"The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it comes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is fascism - ownership of government by an individual, by a group." --Franklin D. Roosevelt

"War has been waged against us by stealth and deceit and murder. This nation is peaceful, but fierce when stirred to anger. This conflict was begun on the timing and terms of others. It will end in a way, and at an hour, of our choosing." --George W. Bush

"When the conduct of men is designed to be influenced, persuasion, kind unassuming persuasion, should ever be adopted. It is an old and true maxim that 'a drop of honey catches more flies than a gallon of gall.' So with men. If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend. Therein is a drop of honey that catches his heart, which, say what he will, is the great highroad to his reason, and which, once gained, you will find but little trouble in convincing him of the justice of your cause, if indeed that cause is really a good one." --Abraham Lincoln

"To arrive at a just estimate of a renowned man's character one must judge it by the standards of his time, not ours." --Mark Twain

"It is with trifles and when he is off guard that a man best reveals his character." --Arthur Schopenhauer

"When men speak ill of thee, live so as nobody may believe them." --Plato

"He that has light within his own clear breast may sit in the center, and enjoy bright day: But he that hides a dark soul and foul thoughts benighted walks under the mid-day sun." --John Milton

"Of all the properties which belong to honorable men, not one is so highly prized as that of character." --Henry Clay

"There is nothing so comfortable as money, but nothing so defiling if it be come by unworthily; nothing so comfortable, but nothing so noxious if the mind be allowed to dwell upon it constantly. If a man have enough, let him spend it freely. If he wants it, let him earn it honestly. Let him do something for it, so that the man who pays it to him may get its value. But to think that it may be got by gambling, to hope to live after that fashion, to sit down with your fingers almost in your neighbours pockets, with your eye on his purse, trusting that you may know better than he some studied calculations as to the pips concealed in your hands, praying to the only god you worship that some special card may be vouchsafed to you, that I say is to have left far, far behind you, all nobility, all gentleness, all manhood!" --Anthony Trollope: The Duke's Children